Flyers, Bobrobvsky Look To Grab Two Precious Points From Leafs

The Philadelphia Flyers (44-24-8) will enter tonight's game without something they have relied on heavily recently, a hot goaltender. As has been reported this week, Ilya Bryzgalov will not be with the team tonight when they travel up to Toronto to take on the Maple Leafs (33-35-9).

Bryzgalov suffered a bone chip on a weight bearing bone in his foot when he took a Jakub Voracek shot off his skate in warm-ups before the Flyers faced the Tampa Bay Lightning on Monday night.

Paul Holmgren has remained optimistic that Bryzgalov could be back to practice on Friday and playing in this weekend's games. But with the Flyers inconsistent injury reports this season, it’s hard to believe it before you see it.

In will step Sergei Bobrovsky who is 12-9-1 with a 3.03 goals against average on the season. He has not started a game since March 11th and did not fare well in his last six starts as he went 1-5 with a 5.19 goals against average.

Although he is getting this start because of the injury to Bryzgalov, one would think he would have seen action in a game coming down the stretch here anyway.

While Bobrovsky will certainly have to shake off the rust, he is playing for his future, whether it be the near future or distant. Expect a valiant effort from him this evening.

Not only will the Flyers have to compete tonight without their best player in the month of March, they will do so without their defensive mainstay, Kimmo Timonen. He has been ruled out for this evening's game and is listed as day-to-day with an upper body injury.

With that and a banged up Andreas Lilja, the Flyers called up Marc-Andre Bourdon to fill in the defensive hole. Needless to say it would behoove the Flyers to keep the puck in the Toronto end and control the tempo, reducing the defensive zone play.

Toronto maybe just what the doctor ordered for the Flyers. They have struggled lately especially at home where they are 0-7-3 since they last won against the Edmonton Oilers on February 6th.

During that time the Leafs have been outscored 36-18 while suffering three shutouts, the most recent one coming Tuesday night versus the Carolina Hurricanes where they were shutout 3-0. With James Reimer still out the Maple Leafs will turn to Jonas Gustavsson (17-17-4, 2.92 gaa).

Both the Flyers and the Leafs have reached out to their perspective farm clubs for tonight's backups. The Flyers have recalled Jason Bacashihua from the Adirondack Phantoms while the Leafs called up Ben Scrivens from the Marlies to work the doors for the perspective teams.

With nothing to play for but a 10 game home winless streak, Toronto and its fans will come hard at the Flyers giving this game a playoff type atmosphere, a feeling the Leafs fans have not felt in a while.

Speaking of the playoffs, with a win tonight the Flyers can finish no lower than a sixth seed as they inch their way up the standings.